All of the pain, none of the gain. Which might as well be the motto for this particular government based on their messaging

The original sin of this gov was trying to be clever and pull an Osborne re: the black hole. What that's ended up with is constant negative economic sentiment, and an association with that first budget and the black hole - ie. taxes weren't to increase public spending, but to fill that hole.

The only person to have broken containment, whose economic messaging I've come across in the wild, is Miliband

If I'm barely hearing about it here on bluesky of all places then I don't think we can blame the media environment though

But they simply don't talk about it. They could if they wanted to, we've seen that it's still possible to set the agenda!
But Starmer says he wants every talking point to be about growth and the economy, the day after the government's assault on the asylum system that dominated headlines for a week.

Took me 2 or 3 to beat her, so not bad!

Hadestown, in my opinion. First quarter is very good, but the second half is flawless. It just gets up and starts running

My greatest disappointment with Starmer is the continuation of this same old game. Half-arsed policy with focus on electoral dynamics over effectiveness. Underlying situation gets worse. Then you complain the border is out of control, when in fact it is your policymaking which has failed.

Indeed. Plus it cedes moral high ground. Even if U-turned or never intended to be enacted, Labour ministers can't denounce a Reform or Conservative party policy that matches this one.

They won't get u-turned if there's no backlash. TACO-trading leads to trump not TACOing, cos he's no longer punished by the market for that particular policy (even if the market hates it).

And if nothing else, in this political climate, people want to be on the record denouncing abhorrent policies

At 15, waiter at Deans' Shortbread's cafe-bistro. Got plenty of free broken shortbread!

Hell, they stated in their manifesto that their ambition was to INCREASE DFID spending. That right there in my view is a broken manifesto promise

Especially since it was originally meant in relation to service workers (especially in the US) where they are expected to be seen as perfectly happy and approachable no matter what, which can be genuinely difficult and harmful if you're struggling in your personal life.

Generative AI being 'wrong' in the information it produces, and being unethical in how it steals human labor are both overlapping issues and it's important to show a bit of damn solidarity even if you're not a scientist, or information worker, or a writer, or an artist, or a photographer

Flow of the vote in the average Lab gain from Con seat, i.e. somewhere like Southend E, Carlisle or Rugby.

The largest dynamics here are Con -> Ref and Lab -> DK, tho Lab's wider splintering is costing them and allowing Reform a clear lead in such seats.

This is why these kinds of takes don't really grasp what is happening in what are currently Reform-facing Labour seats. The actual Lab -> Ref movement is small (and the least likely to reverse). Labour's key to remaining competitive is reuniting their losses to don't knows, LDs and Greens.

The exact opposite. Tenants currently don't get interest on their deposits. I think they should

Interest on rental deposits. The current system actively punishes long-term tenancy